Rand Paul takes anti-Hillary Clinton Benghazi battle to Iowa

Paul told reporters that the former secretary of state was 'absolutely responsible.' | AP Photo

It remains to be seen whether the controversy over the Benghazi attack will take a toll on Clinton’s public image. Recent public opinion polls have pegged her as one of the best-liked politicians in the country, a prohibitive favorite for her party’s 2016 nomination and a strong general election candidate.

In that light, it’s no surprise that Republican politicians and advocacy organizations – including the conservative outside groups American Crossroads and America Rising – have sought to hype the congressional hearings this week as a blemish on Clinton’s record.

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And Paul is not the only would-be Republican president taking a bat to the Democratic party’s most pined-for potential candidate. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio penned a USA Today op-ed Thursday declaring that new revelations from the House inquiry undercut Clinton’s reputation and credibility.

“The House hearing raises new questions about Secretary Hillary Clinton’s role in the administration’s efforts to portray the attack as the result of a spontaneous demonstration, despite abundant evidence to the contrary and efforts by one of her top lieutenants to intimidate those who were asking the right questions,” Rubio wrote. “We need to bring those behind this attack to justice and make sure that a tragedy like Benghazi does not happen again.”

If this week’s anti-Clinton pile-on has turned into something of a rhetorical bidding war, it may be difficult to top Paul’s extended bombardment Friday.

Indeed, at his public appearances Friday afternoon, Paul sounded like an undeclared candidate eager to draw aggressive contrasts with the most formidable of his possible Democratic foes.

Whenever an Iowa Republican brought up Benghazi, Paul immediately trained his fire on Clinton, casting her as a delinquent leader at the State Department who failed to heed calls for additional diplomatic security.

“She came before my committee and said she never read any of the cables,” Paul told his fans in a Cedar Rapids living room.

While others in his party have focused on allegations that the White House misidentified a terrorist attack as a spontaneous riot, or failed to provide reinforcements to the consulate on the day of the attack, Paul said he’s most alarmed by the run-up to that bloody day.

He trashed Clinton for suggesting the State Department didn’t have enough money to secure its embassies, and questioned why State – as opposed to the military – had taken charge of protecting the installation to begin with.

“The ambassador wrote a direct cable to her [requesting security] and she said she didn’t even read it. That was a month before the attack,” Paul said. “She says, ‘oh, I didn’t have enough money.’ They spent $100,000 on an electrical charging station at the Vienna embassy.”

At his afternoon press conference, the senator likened the Benghazi incident to the Black Hawk Down catastrophe in Somalia in the 1990s, when 18 Americans died in a botched rescue mission in Mogadishu.

And lest any reporters failed to remember who was president at the time, Paul was ready with a reminder.

Benghazi, he said, was “a tragic lack of leadership, similar to what Les Aspin did in Mogadishu under Bill Clinton. And he ultimately resigned his office.”

Paul acknowledged at one point that as a member of the Senate minority, there’s relatively little that he can do directly to force accountability on Benghazi from the executive branch. That task, he said, will fall mostly to the GOP-held House.

“I have less power, other than being on television talking about it,” Paul said.